Illustrious House pt 2 – Piero

Part One

Here is part two. Only one more to go. I’m not sure I’ve much to say at this point other than the fact that I kept changing the spelling of Cromwell’s name (Cremuel, Cromuel etc.) but it’s all the same chap. Though truly, it’s not that important. He makes a suggestion for a title for Niccolo and that’s it.

I forget if I mentioned that there have been many liberties taken with history in this story. I don’t really have Cesare leave Imola during the capture of Vitellozo etc. I mean it’s not explicitely stated in the story that he stays in the city, but I don’t make it clear that he left either. Whatever. Doesn’t matter for the plot.

He was with Cicero as he traveled to Imola. With Cicero is spirit, in mind, in body, and soul but not will, not desire, not agreeance. No more than he was in agreeance with Plato and Aristotle and their too other worldly concerns. Concerns of the ends and means and Good and Justice and the End as in the telos, which didn’t have a true meaning in Latin. Frenchmen with Louis said it was a je ne sais quoi and would shrug their shoulders in their vague French way. The English would just say damn if they knew. What use were Greeks anyhow? Did they know how to keep accounts? Did they barter with tight fisted Dutch and Florentines over wool prices? Did they contend with kings and wars within and without and the issue of succession? Did they ever meet the Welsh? The Scotts?

No, Niccolò had answered. No, because they made art and wrote philosophy and searched for meaning in a seemingly meaningless life. Niccolò had thought it profound at the time but he was beginning to doubt it all. Urbino, Froli, Imola, all of Romagna – for what? Pisa, Milan, Venice, Verona – for what? Leonardo da Vinci – for what?
Glory. He could hear that Spanish accented voice hiss it. Not as strong as the would-be-holy-father’s but still very much Spanish despite all his Italian blood. Glory. The only end to a political life. A life well lived. Glory every lasting. Amen.
Telos found.

“So you’ve arrived,” the voice was the would-be-prince’s and Niccolò caught himself smiling something smug. The fact that the younger man felt anything aside from a light passing interest was beginning to dawn on him. A foreign notion and so all the more thrilling.

“That I have, at your summons, of course.”

“My summons and the Signoria’s orders.”

He was wearing black and silver with that too white feather in his cap. There was a word that the English ambassador to Louis had used to describe such a man and it fit better than anything he could have come up with in Italian but he found he couldn’t remember it. It began with an ‘F’ and Cesare was looking puzzled at his sudden pensiveness.

“I was thinking of a word to describe you with,” he explained as the younger man took his arm and pulled him from his chair and books and stories.

“It was flattering, I hope.”

“Always.”

“Never, then.” But the smile he gave was cheery and Niccolò could understand why Urbino and Imola and all the others had gone without a fight. Cesare was youth and eagerness and everything handsome combined into one. Who wouldn’t want such a prince? Even Florence would have fallen to the charm, the je-ne-sais-quoi. Lorenzo il Magnifico had been a Cesare but a more human one. Niccolò wasn’t sure which one he preferred.

“How are you finding our artist?” Niccolò asked as he was guided into a gallery. There were faces and long dead eyes he felt he should know staring down at him. “I hope he is making the deal worth while.”

“He is, certainly. I think you got the raw end.”

“If you insist.”

“Florentines and their freedom,” it was hummed and Cesare was all bubbly happiness. The anger, the hidden cruelness, the everything that was dark in Urbino was suddenly gone under the sun of victory in Imola. “It’ll be gone one day, whether by Milan or Venice or the Medici – it will be gone.”

“Or by you.”

Silence which was consent and Niccolò allowed himself a small smile as he was delivered into an airy room. It was empty save for a large table, a high backed chair and the sight of worn boots propped up and the start of a stained tunic and leggings.

“I thought you would want to see each other, both being Florentines.”

The man in the chair stood, the sound of boots hitting the floor preceded his bow and greeting. Niccolò unlaced his arm from Cesare’s and strode forward, grasping Leonardo’s shoulders and pulling him into a hug.

“Been a while, Leo! I missed you while you were in Florence, ships passing in the night.”

The older man smiled back and his face was the knotty pine tree that Niccolò knew all too well.

“I was keeping my head low, you were busy anyhow with work, wife, and roaming.”

“That I was,” the grimace was dramatic so Leonardo knew to laugh. Glancing back towards Cesare he gave another bow.

“You’ve brought a devil into your lair,” he said with pat on Niccolò’s back. “He’s a damn sneaky one. I’m convinced he’ll talk his way out of hell and into heaven.”

“Why would I do that? You’ll be in hell, so will Tommaso, and Cesare here, and everyone else we know, it’ll be a grand old time. Besides, I’ve no desire to reside in the same place as our monk Savonarola.”

Leonardo, Niccolò remembered, had a boisterous laugh. A laugh that would fill the whole room and his Moorish eyes were dancing. It was the happiest he had seen him in years.

The duke was eager for a chase. He went on about hounds and horses and bows and men when what he really wanted was to say something about blood spilt on autumn leaves and the screams of dying boors that sounded much like the screams of dying men since the screams of the dying always seem to sound the same. Or that was what Niccolò imagined the duke to think. He often found himself imagining the worst, the most morbid things when it came to his would-be-prince and liked to think himself the precursor to history and posterity.

“They won’t remember you for being a patron of our Leonardo,” he had said it a few nights prior over wine and fresh figs and cheese.

“Then what will I be remembered for? O’ great self appointed fortune teller.”

“Deceit.” A pause, wine was poured. “War mongering.”

“Everyone does that.”

“But not quite so openly. Debauched.”

“Negatives then?”

“The good men do is often buried with their bones.”

“While the evil lives on?”

“Just so.”

They raised glasses to each other and drank. It was the queerest combination of contentedness and unease Niccolò had ever felt.

“You forgot cruelty.”

Niccolò gave a discreet raise of an eyebrow, lips pursed.

“You’ll see,” Cesare said with a wistful-could-be-coy smile. “Drink up.”

And they did. And Niccolò felt that it would be all right.

“Come now, chase the boar with me.” The high spirited younger man whipped his head around, laugh losing itself in the trees. Niccolò gave a non-committal reply and pulled himself back into the present and nudged his horse forward, soon over taking the duke.

“Borgia needs a lesson in pride,” he replied over his shoulder with a wicked grin.

“I thought the Florentine would be humbled by now!”

Niccolò merely laughed and urged his mount on, glancing back to keep an eye on Cesare. The younger man was pure exuberance and glee with green robes that made him think of the forests around Paris and the dark cold of the north. The eyes were what finished that feeling, he decided as he turned to keep an eye on the boar, the eyes were what always finished the feeling when it came to Cesare.

The boar was felled within minutes and Cesare was humming praises and letting out giggles that were much too young and reminded Niccolò that the duke was only twenty-seven so youth was expected.

“Tell me,” he said, catching Cesare by the arm and leading him for a walk as the servants prepared the boar to be taken back to the city. “What are you borrowing our Leonardo for? We’ve a new church door we want done and Piero wants him back for it.”

“Tell me, do you always do as Piero asks?”

“He is my political master.”

“He is your master in all ways, I think.” The smile was amused and Niccolò scowled in return, too tired to be handling the twists of the conversation. “I am using Leonardo for he does best.”

“Art?”

“Hardly, invention, imagination, creation of the impossible since that is what I am trying to do. Create the impossible.”

“He’s making weapons for you?”

“Of a sort.”

Silence. There were birds and insects and Niccolò loved that nature was noisy enough to fill in their conversation. Weapons for a Borgia. And Florence was so close to Imola. So close to Borgia, to Vitellozo, to the condottiero, to the French army, to the everything that was Italian politics.

“We have an agreement,” Niccolò finally said, feeling that something had to be said in that empty, empty space.

“Do we.” A sentence, a question – he wasn’t sure and Cesare wasn’t looking at him so he was fearful.

“How are things proceeding?” Francesco asked, voice low and breath brushing Niccolò’s ear. They were hiding in one of the many shadowy churches that filled the gaps and arches of Imola for the bishop wanted to be there but not actually be there, Cesare was not fond of him, after all. So Niccolò found that Francesco was all breathless anticipation with cassock and riding coat wrapped tight and eyes strained.

“Well enough, I suppose.” Careful, careful. Cesare was bluffing, after all. “I have spoken to Leonardo.”

“And?”

“Nothing.”

They went silent, a street boy walked by sans cap and with a serious look on his face. Niccolò had the grace to appear concerned for the boy in front of Francesco. The bishop never had approved of such games and if the boy’s lover was hiding in a church, all the more condemnation for him, then. Niccolò simply thought it oddly appropriate and truly the only place private. Besides, the bishop had little room to maneuver concerning piety and purity and the sanctity of holy ground.

“He says he can’t show me what he’s created, that Cesare would know since Cesare knows everything and in Imola is God since he’s so omnipresent. People don’t fuck without thinking Borgia knows it. Without knowing that Borgia knows it.” He stopped, aware that the speech had run on too long and all but ignored Francesco’s silent fury. “There’s the trinity, Borgia the father, Borgia the son, and Borgia the omnipresent spirit.” Life was too short not to pick on Francesco. “There’s even the Borgia Madonna, though we’re still waiting for the immaculate conception.”

“And who is the Madonna? Lucretia or Borgia-the-father’s little thing?”

“Both. Neither. I hadn’t thought that far ahead. Whoever sees Gabriel first.”

That earned a smile from Francesco so Niccolò knew he had done all right.

“You are a demon,” Francesco said at last, taking Niccolò’s arm and pulling him farther into the shadows, if it were at possible to be more in the dark than they were already and Niccolò felt that the poetry of the situation was fitting and they could hardly have done better. “But I see why Piero’s taken to you, filthy minded both of you are.”

“Hardly,” he could feel something like annoyance rising, something like anger and Niccolò Machiavelli rarely ever angered.

“Piero is far more noble and gifted than I. He simply puts up with me from some misguided notion that I have potential.”

The older man brushed aside the comment, the false modesty, face suddenly set in a grim line that reminded the ambassador of gargoyles and French churches and Venetian masks. Florentinian masks were supposed to be gay and lively and bumbling so when they hit you between the ribs with a knife you never would have guessed it. Cunning and coy looks were saved for those that truly had no heart.

Marietta, Marie, Mary, Mariana, Madonna, Marietta,

My Dear Marietta. This is Imola so I cannot write truly and well for Cesare is God and knows all, as I confided in Francesco though he does not believe me. He does not believe me but I know for how else could Cesare know? And Cesare knows everything there is to know except what matters. He knows of Francesca and Piero and you but not of Vitellozo or France or the Signoria. He knows of my heart but not my mind and in the end the former will gladly be sacrificed for the latter. I am a cruel man in that way.

I am writing this letter to you so that I can clear my mind and set my soul at ease for truly it is my soul that matters and not yours for yours will be more ill at ease than ever should you set eyes on this paper. Which you wont since it will have been burnt before even the omnipresent would-be-Prince knows of it. And that is well and good. I am all right with him knowing my heart, but my mind and my soul and my conscience I’d rather him never know. I’d rather him never know because I don’t want to know and what he knows he makes sure I know, makes sure I know damn well. Fuck him and his coy smile that is nothing like Piero so all I can think of is Piero.

There is an English boy here who is called Crumuel, Tommaso being the first of his names. He is a bull dog and fights everything that moves including himself. I think I’d take a liking to him if I could get anything out of him beyond a “how d’you do, sir” in horrid Genoese Italian. I told him to go to Florence to learn to speak. He said he would and to learn a few other things since Italy had much to teach and he had much to learn. He is right, of course. And Florence will teach him about smiles, about fearing shadows, about always looking behind you, about not being able to sleep for too many reasons to count, about life as it is and not as it ought to be. He’s old enough to understand, I think, though he’s still just a boy.

I don’t think his name was actually Crumuel but merely what someone dubbed his English name when he came to us and he was content enough to let it be. Should he go to the English court he will make something of himself. The summer of Cesare Borgia will mark him. He will stare at frescos instead of fists and find an easier way to be.

I am remembering my father and his stiff rule and stiff fist and stiff drink. Wine was never enough for him but he was bright and mostly kind so I think I learned to love him after a fashion. After a very long fashion. It has always taken us Machiavellis a long time to do anything. We’re slow learners and damned stubborn when we want to be. Keep that in mind, my dear Marietta, for you are married to one and bearing one. Your life is owned by the Machiavellis now and we don’t let go too easily. It’s the bastardization of once noble blood, or so I’ve been told.

Stories. I’m sure there are stories to tell. Lots of them. Stories of this foreign court around this foreign prince in this foreign city. But I can’t think of any that would amuse you. Can’t think of any that you would want to hear. Because I can’t imagine that you’d care to know that Cesare looks at me the same way Tommaso looks at Francesca during the Mass. Looks at me because he knows he will have me, after a fashion. The same as he has everyone. After a fashion. And hopefully I will remember to forget everything when the time comes. I don’t think he’d care to be called the wrong name, after all.

You always bore me patiently. Which means you’ve always suffered. And for that I am sorry. I am sorry for marrying you. I am sorry for leaving you. I am sorry for Francesca and the other girls whose names I can’t remember. I am sorry for Cesare. I am sorry for the future. Mea Culpa. I am a sinner. If sinning truly mattered after it all ends, that is.

My dear Marietta. I wish you could read this and know and be at ease for you were going to be my salvation but fell just this much short of being the Mary I needed just as I fell this much short of being your Joseph. The child will never be a Joshua, but perhaps that is all right.

Yours, as always, with my affection, my attention, but never my love,

Niccolò who wishes, sometimes, that he wasn’t a Machiavelli.

The girls name was Marie and she looked too much like his own Marie that was Marietta that was his false Madonna for his tastes. Cesare merely smiled that coy, coy, coy, all knowing smile and told him to have fun. That she was a good ride. That she knew what she was doing with a man.

“She was at the French court, lady in waiting to a duchess, but truly attended the duke.”

“A pattern is emerging, I see.” He said it in monotone and Cesare laughed, grabbing his hand in acknowledgment of the hit. One to one. They were even. “And your Angela? Whatever happened to her?”

“Her husband decided that she needed to see Venice, and Verona, and possibly as far as Vienna.”

“Did he now?” He was looking at anything but the demure girl in front of him.

“For her health.”

“How much into her term?”

“I don’t remember.” The younger man paused a delicate pause. “And your Marietta?”

“I remembered to forget,” and he said it roughly while grabbing the girl and running from the room. One to two. He should have left the subject of angels and conceptions well enough alone.

Piero wrote to him. The November cold was beginning to set in and Niccolò was readying himself for a long, cruel winter. Cesare brought the winter here, he was sure. Perhaps that was why he would be remembered as cruel.

He wrote to say that Marietta was in good health and that the baby kicked. Forgive him, but he had to write it. Niccolò, Niccolò, you are a father. He could hear that warm, warm voice murmuring it over the wine same as he had murmured well wishes and soft jokes before he left for the God forsaken world that was Imola. Niccolò, Niccolò, you must accept it, you must embrace it. Never fight it, fight it and they will be bitter and you will be bitter and when you are old and almost gone you will regret it.
He wrote to say that Francesca was well, that Tommaso was well and in one sentence so Niccolò knew they were still whatever it was that they were. He wrote to say that the wine grapes were well, that his estates were reaping a profit, that the Florin was holding steady, that the factions had died down for the moment, that everything was well. But not that Piero Soderini was well and so Niccolò knew that he wasn’t.

It was an early dusk that day and Niccolò felt the need to stretch his legs while the fading light made it easy. The gardens around the palace were something sweet and pleasant and much like the gardens in Florence only less colourful, less vibrant, less fragrant simply based on the fact that they weren’t the gardens in Florence.

Leonardo found him with robes pulled up about his neck and ears and cap shoved forward over his forehead letting all know he was brooding and not to be disturbed on pain of death via verbal evisceration. Leonardo took the sight in, grinned cheerfully, and barged on forward. He would be forgiven by the moody younger man, just as he was always forgiven by the moody younger man. He was, he found, a very forgivable person.

“Things are brewing,” he opened with. Niccolò glared in response. Things were always brewing. “I thought you’d want to know.”

“Vitellozo,” muttered darkly and Leonardo gave a sage nod. “Yes, yes, we know.”

“Do you?”

“Cesare rides the tides of fortune and Vitellozo is breaking those tides, ruining those fortunes. A Pazzi Easter Sunday for the new Medici that will never be a Medici.”

“Nor a Julius or Gaius or Marius, though he wishes he were.”

“No,” Niccolò was firmly shaking his head. His body was rejecting the very notion. “An Augustus, a Trajan, a Nero even. In his own way.”

“In his own fashion,” said with a chuckle and Niccolò allowed it to pass. “But I think he wishes he were a Julius.”

“Julius had potential to be a republican, to be a prince, to be something unheard of yet marvelous but he chose the earthy and mundane. Cesare has potential to be a prince and only that. He is hardly the stuff of Gaius Julius.”

“And Vitellozo hardly the stuff of Brutus?”

“Neither Brutus’ – the king slayer or the tyrant slayer. More a Cassius. More a something I can’t put my finger on but it’s disgusting, regardless. But you have more news?”

“I have news that makes me not able to sleep at night.”

“You have a life that makes you not able to sleep at night.”

Leonardo didn’t respond and Niccolò apologized, making sure his eyes showed that he meant it because he found he did.

“But I can only tell you about Vitellozo because Borgia will be telling you of Vitellozo tonight, after dinner.”

“I will be meeting him after dinner?” A low whistle. “My, my, the things you know my dear Leonardo.”

“The things I wish I didn’t know, actually, my dear Niccolò. Now. I am an old man and must get myself inside where there isn’t a breeze to hurt my joints.”

Niccolò found he had nothing to say but a muttered thank you as he watched grey hair disappearing amongst fragrant, dying flowers in a colourful, dying garden. Cesare Borgia was bringing the winter and he was the reason these flowers would die.

He remembered hearing a story, once. He, Tommaso, Piero and Biagio had been in the countryside and Tommaso was lamenting the loss of yet another True Love. Biagio would interject with “well what did you expect you asshole?” and Niccolò remembered why he both hated and loved them. Piero had been musing on something and had pulled ahead, mind elsewhere else with eyes a dark, dark brown that was almost black.

“Is all well in Casa Soderini?” He had asked, nudging his horse next to the older man’s and giving as affable a smile as he could give. Piero’s spirits could plunge deep and dark but Niccolò had discovered that he had the happy talent of lifting them back out.

“Indeed.” Distracted. So very distracted. And he remained aloof as Niccolò prattled on about Francesca and Francesco and Antonio and Antonia. “Have you ever thought of poison?” He asked suddenly when there was a lull.

“You mean the Eucharist? I think about it every day I don’t take it.” And he had meant it despite the fact that these were still the days of Savonarola and the cult of the Ancients and the cult of antipathy and the cult of cynicism were all long dead and burned and buried. Burned and buried with the beautiful paintings and books that had once held such strong sway.

“I shall ignore that, for your health. And I was thinking of a poison made within a boar’s body that takes months to work and tastes like water. You drink it now and in six months you’ll be dead of it.”

“Ghastly. A Medici product?”

“A Borgia product.”

“A who?”

For Alexander VI wasn’t Alexander VI yet (still an unknown cardinal with an eye for the top job) and Lucretia and Cesare and Giulono were not yet born and Borgia was just an Italian bastardization of a Spanish name that meant nothing.

“Borgia. A cardinal in Rome.”

“Cardinals are always on about poison. Poison and treason and heresy and stakes and oh dear, the Germans are protesting what are we to do? Shall we have an orgy?”

“The Germans are protesting?”

“When are the Germans not protesting?”

“I thought that was the job of the French.”

Niccolò shrugged and had said that if the church knew what was good for her (and she doesn’t) she’d shape up. Yes, yes, Wycliff was gone and Jan Hus was dead, and maybe Bohemia got away and all in all things are as they should be but he was willing to bet his life on the Germans being the first to do something about it. They were too much the stuff of merchants to care for the Church. And Erasmus was very popular there, after all. And where Erasmus is popular and Jan Hus was once preached…the sentence was never finished but Piero could well guess and didn’t care to comment.

“I was just wondering what it would be like, to die of Borgia poisoning. You strangle to death.”

“Like drowning then, but worse.”

The older man nodded and went silent, horse moving ahead of Niccolò’s and the ambassador who was only a secretary then, knew better than to follow.

“You’re having a moment,” Cesare was amiable and smiling and being as charming as he could. Urbino had revolted but he wasn’t concerned for he claimed he remembered how to take it.

“I was reminiscing.” Niccolò offered hoping with a discreet hope that Cesare would ask no more and turn the discussion to Vitellozo and Orsini and Fregaso and all the others who hate him and wished him dead but of whom he had no fear. No visible fear. Niccolò always made sure to remember that Cesare was an actor.

“About –“ The curious look.

“Religion. Of sorts.”

“Ah, I never took you for a religious man.”

“That’s because I’m not.” He paused, picked at the cuffs of his robe. “I’m not but I am. I’m a Florentine and we all were when Savonarola was there and we were all pagans when Lorenzo was there and now we’re republicans and our religion is our state and we worship freedom and Soderini.”

“And does your Piero like the worship?”

“Yes and no.” He turned away so Cesare wouldn’t be able to see the truth he knew was written so clearly on his face. The truth that Piero hated it and wanted nothing more than to be a virtuous Florentine and a good man and help his country but in helping his country as the first citizen meant being everything but virtuous and good. Private values were public evils.

“Have you heard from the Signoria?” The subject change was a kindness. Niccolò found himself thankful for Cesare’s understanding despite the fact that the duke truly didn’t understand. Some things only Florentines could understand.

“Yes and no,” he said it with a smile and Cesare laughed, saying that he was a true civil servant. Straight answers, Niccolò replied, were for the weak and the faint of heart. “They are hesitant, they are unsure of the outcome, they are unsure of your position. In regards to Vitellozo and his allies.”

“My position! They question my position!” The fuse was lit and Cesare railed on.

Francesco bit his lip worriedly as Niccolò finished the letter, face as angry as he had ever seen it. There were crease lines he didn’t remember being on the younger man’s face before, creases that were ten years early.

“He will win in this.” Niccolò growled it out over ink and quills and paper. Francesco merely bobbed his head and frowned. “He has the advantage.”

“Which is?”

“That he is alone,” the younger man looked up. There was an ink smear on his chin and down his left cheek. Eyes were so cold it was horrid. “He can act quickly and decisively. The element of surprise is on his side, not theirs.”

“But they have a greater number.”

Hands flew up in frustration and an ink well was spilled; the floor stained. “Fine! They have more! So does Florence and has that made us strong? Has that made us powerful? We need him and must grab him while he still thinks he needs us.”

Silence. Francesco reached forward and took the letter, ignoring the grey hair that fell in his face, in fact almost thankful for it for it meant he didn’t have to meet Niccolò’s gaze.

“When I was a boy I remember running to my uncle’s house on the feast of St. Michael,” he glanced over to Cesare to see if he was listening. The younger man was brooding and nodding and was there but not there so Niccolò decided to continue. “I was ten, or thereabouts. And there were rioters in the city. Rioters yelling about il popolo and libertas and all the usual nonsense that rioters yell about and I wanted to know why. My father, for all his faults, was a good citizen and so stuck by the Medici. My father said that the rioters were to go to hell; my uncle said that the torture chamber was close enough so my father was right in an essence. I didn’t understand what he had meant at the time.”

“Did you see anyone die?”

“I was five when I first saw death and understood. Or understood as well as any five year could. I knew they were not going to move again and that I would never see them again.”

“Who was it?”

“An aunt. She died of something my uncle couldn’t afford the medicine for. Or perhaps she died of something there wasn’t any medicine for. Either way I was there when she was given last unction and watched her gurgle and spew bile until she lay still and my uncle’s face went even more so.” He eyed the wine, still remembering stories told by Piero. Stories of poison, of dark nights, of Spanish blood being hotter than Italian, of ruthless smiles and drowning deaths. “And you?”

“I was eleven. A cardinal died.”

“That old? I would have thought younger.”

It earned an interested look from the duke and Niccolò answered it with the shrug he had learned in France and the smile from Venice.

“My father had invited him to dinner. It was during the first course, died of heart failure.”

“Did he now?”

Cesare grinned and patted Niccolò’s arm, “come, come, I believed your stories. It’s only fair you believe mine.”

“But mine were true,” a pointed look.

“Some of them were true. The rioters didn’t happen, you don’t mention the Medici unless you have to or unless your Piero is involved. Then you will expound for hours.”

“I don’t know what you’re suggesting.” He tried to play coy, to make it lighter, to make it what it wasn’t. Tried but Cesare wasn’t having any of it and merely shook his head. No, no, that would not do, he was saying, that would not do at all. Tell me of Louis and Il Magnifico and Boticelli and the Monk. Tell me of Florence, Cesare asked. Tell me of France, of Venice, of Milan – so that I may better understand you. Tell me stories that are true, that happened, that are earthy and full of you and no one else. Maybe your Piero, if you insist. Though, Cesare said with a laugh, I’m not fond of him, for obvious reasons.

There was a paper jammed into Ovid when he returned from one of the too many meetings with Cesare and council. There were rumblings in Urbino. More rumblings, that is, apart from the usual and always-have-been rumblings. And Rome. Rome after Cesare’s father may not be as congenial as it is now and the would-be-prince would have to contend with that. And Florence? Florence just smiled and murmured consent and said “I’m so very sorry, we cannot make any firm promises at the moment, perhaps within the week…” and Cesare let it be though not happily.

It was a sketch of a machine. A machine with a man inside with a gun attached to the front and would be able to withstand fire power. Metal and wheels and flintlock and Niccolò thought it madness but since he was a good Florentine citizen he embraced it anyhow.

“This is what he wants?” He found the artist, who was more inventor than anything, in what had been termed “the lair” and served as Leonardo’s study, workshop, art room and more. Niccolò was under the impression that the man only left when Cesare summoned him and when he was hungry to sniff out food at odd hours of the morning.

“One of the many,” a cheerful smile and an erratic wave of his hands. “I’ve more. I think I could possibly manage to get humans to fly.”

“Madness,” whispered, but with amusement and kindness. He knew Leonardo was used to the proclamations but becoming inured to something doesn’t mean it hurts less. “And I am assuming that the duke will be showing me drawings of this tonight? After supper perhaps?”

“Perhaps,” the grey head was bowed over more paper. A woman was slowly emerging. “Do you want anything? I’m taking offers. Your charming wife perhaps?”

“No. Thank you.” He carefully placed the sketch of the strange contraption away as Leonardo looked up with something like understanding in his gaze. Niccolò detested it so made sure to laugh and be gay. So long as he was witty, so long as he was happy, charming, no one would ask, no one would understand.

“How about yourself? Would you like a portrait done?”

Eyes were appearing on the page, a square jaw, thin lips, crooked nose – he turned away before Leonardo could finish.

“No. Thank you. I was here to ask your advice on a matter.”

“No.”

“Pardon?”

“You will regret it, everyone regrets it I’ve noticed.”

“Regrets what?”

Another fluttery wave of the hand and the older man turned away, rummaging about for something. Niccolò watched with a patient look, content to let the artist be as eccentric as he’d like.

“Borgia. Everyone regrets Borgia.” Those eyes turned to him and were far too old, far too knowing for the ambassador to be comfortable. He suddenly wished himself back in Florence, back even with Marietta, with Francesca, watching Tommaso woo his former mistress, things were easier in Florence. There were rules and people followed them and even when broken they were still understandable. Still comprehensible. Imola was a different beast and he was finding it all distasteful. Spanish blood, he decided, was the reason.

“I was thinking of Florence and forming an alliance with him. My political masters are worried about Urbino and the recent rebellion and Vitellozo and his allies. Do you think Borgia will come out well?”

“I do not think anything. But as you said to the Bishop Francesco, Cesare Borgia is alone and has everything to loose. That is quite the motivator I have come to find. For those that care, that is. Don’t be daft and hope they will all kill each other. They wont. Now, I think the duke wants to see you. Don’t do anything stupid.”

“I shall keep that in mind,” he glanced down at the paper jutting out from between the pages of his book. “And thank you.”

“You should have your portrait done, something for the world to remember you by.”

“My memory, I think, will be best captured in another way.”

“If you mean your writing I think you’d best choose a different course. All philosophers regret writing anything down after they see the way people butcher their meaning. Look at Plato, Aristotle, Cicero – you’re a learned man, you understand.”

And Niccolò did but found he had more pressing matters to worry about than his legacy post-mortem. It was not his place in the world to worry about it for he was not a prince, not a duke, not a first citizen and so the telos of his life was not the telos of Cesare’s or Piero’s or Piero di Lorenzo di Piero di Cosimo’s. His was something else, though what exactly, he wasn’t sure.

Cesare wanted to tell him a story. Have you heard of Prestor Jon? He asked with a bland smile and glittering eyes. Niccolò nodded and wrapped his cloak about him, the winter chill was beginning to arrive and he suspected that Cesare felt all the more at home in it despite his cold bloodedness.

“Everyone has heard of the illusive Prestor Jon,” he said with a supple shrug. “Are you thinking of searching for him?”

“Perhaps,” the younger slid his arm through Niccolò’s and led him deeper into the garden, away from the eyes in the walls that were windows through which people who knew too little watched them. “Leonardo said that Prestor Jon was inside us all so perhaps searching for him wont be as difficult as venturing to the east.”

“Or much harder,” but he refrained from saying more for Cesare was not a man to concern himself with himself. Or the Himself that was spiritual, that was deeper than the latest pretty face and quick run at power and glory.

“I met a man once, who said he had been to Prestor Jon’s court.”

“Was his name Baudolino?”

“No, why?”

“So he had no gift for prophesy, do continue.”

“His name was Niklaus. Niklaus Makaricheva. I suppose what he said may have been false, he was a story teller after all. He told me that he had been to see Prestor Jon and the court was on a mountain surrounded by a sea that was full of emerald fish and dolphins of sapphires. He is a goodly prince who is kind to all and through his kindness and perfect Christian brotherhood has managed to convert the infidel who surround him.”

“Master Makaricheva needs a new story.”

“And there are maidens whose hair is gold like the sun and whose voices are beautiful and would sing of the east and the wind and the colours of the world though they had never seen it. They had the gift of sight without seeing.”

“Yet no observation if they sang of a beautiful and perfect world.”

“Leonardo said that they had the gift of hope.”

Niccolò opened his mouth to reply but found he couldn’t. Some things weren’t worth the time to contradict, others were worth too much to contradict. He wasn’t sure which one the gift of hope was.

“I would like to meet this story teller of yours, this Niklaus Makaricheva.” It was said with a coy smile and irony but Cesare either didn’t notice or chose not to notice and simply smiled and nodded and smiled some more and said that Niccolò had already met him, he was sure of it. He was the patron saint of Florence though the Florentines didn’t know it.

“Mars is our patron saint,” Niccolò muttered as they parted. “I am reminded of it every day that I live.”

Niccolò found Francesco in his rooms reading Livy. The well worn pages slipped through the bishop’s fingers as easily as the well worn thighs of the woman he had been with the night before.

“There was a Roman emperor, once,” Francesco began as Niccolò poured them wine. “Who had the world but wanted the moon as well and in reaching for it he fell. He fell sixty or so times and the last blow was the worst for it came from a friend.” He looked up to meet Niccolò’s steady, steady, I-know-this-story, gaze. “Is Cesare in good health?”

“Yes, though I think time is up for Cassius. Come back in two weeks, there ought to be a show.”

“I hate it when you’re dispassionate, it reminds me of Cosimo.”

“I can’t say that I’m sorry.”

My dear Piero,

I should not be writing this to you so I am not. I spend my days thinking of you as something else. As something you are not. As a Templar before the king of France and His Holiness slaughtered them, as a Hospitlar, as a warrior on horseback or some blithe youth with ruddy cheeks and hair dark brown as it once was. But you are too much flesh and bones for me to think of these fantasies for long so I find myself pondering the mysteries of Florence and of your house with its fine wooden floors and beautiful frescoes in the chapel and your handsome face with that smile that is so very much you and your poor wife who wished for children but God, in his glory and cruelty, saw fit to deny her.

They made you gonfaloniere for life because of that. Because you have no children and because you have a kind smile and a sad wife. All men who lead Florence must have kind smiles and sad wives. It’s the Medici precedent and yet I find that I am of no mind to jest about the past. Instead, I find myself wishing I was home and wishing I could send all the things I write. The Signoria complain of my lack of letters and Biagio, in his wisdom, tells me to be less blunt. Yet, I can follow no instructions. It’s not in my nature, you see.

I write letters. I write stories and fairy tales and spin parables and find adjectives and adverbs for things I wish I had and use the wrong pronoun for elle should be il but to use il is to be burned and fuck I hate this. I am not a man who enjoys trifles like love. I’d rather make a grand thing of it. You know me well enough to know that. I haven’t written sonnets yet but that is because I haven’t found a friend who will read them and understand that was is written is a code for everything I have just explained.

Cesare Borgia has broken a part of me through knowing me in that he knows about you and so knows me. And damnit, he knew me before I knew myself. It hurts a man, to be known before he himself has figured it all out. He guessed after our first meeting when I said that I had come from the Signoria but truly Piero Soderini sent me. I must have smiled as I said your name. I must have had something in my eyes. My face must have betrayed me. My ever smiling, never changing, thin lipped, hawked nosed, cropped haired, square jawed face. My face that betrays nothing betrayed me. It broke me. I will write about this in years to come and men will think that I am cruel and so be it. Cesare Borgia taught me to be cruel.

I wrote to Marietta about a boy named Crumuel and that the summer of Cesare Borgia would mark him and that he would find an easier way to be. I should have written that to you for you would have understood that Crumuel might have been me and that I will never be Niccolò Machiavelli as I once was. I am Niccolò Machiavelli who no longer laughs unless it’s a cruel joke, who no longer smiles unless there’s something of the winter in it, who no longer believes in the ideal of Florence. The republic will fall. It will not be to our Borgia Prince. But it will fall. Cesare will die some inglorious death and you will – dear God in your hell forgive me – you too will fall and I will fall because of this letter and everything meant by it. And Florence will fall. There will be nights and no days and we will be enslaved as we once were. I have just broken a promise I made to myself and to my father.

So be it.

I am cruel for writing this and burning it. Piero Soderini, please forgive me, I am an unlikely Prince in my cruelty. Piero Soderini, please, on the night you fall, on the night you die, say a prayer for me. It will be the only prayer that has ever truly mattered.

When he comes for me I will think of you.

He burned the letter and drank wine and wrote a new one. It was to the Signoria and the contents were brutal in their bluntness but he was too far gone to care.

The signoria were holding out and Piero was begging them to accept Niccolò’s propositions. He knew the situation better than anyone. Francesco even put in a good word. Said something about two weeks being all they had to decide. But old men don’t like change, don’t like listening to one who is twenty or so years younger than them, don’t like the swift merciless actions of the child who was given too much power, don’t like how close those camp fires of the army are, don’t like how quickly Urbino falls and falls and falls, don’t like much and Piero is tired of pushing them.

“You will have to make do. Can you say that we are for him but without putting it on paper?” Francesco asks. It has been two weeks and Vitellozo and his men are coming for a state visit. They have been forgiven by the would-be-prince and are to be taken back into the fold. Cesare said that one must show humility and mercy upon occasions. Leonardo simply gave a grim bark of a laugh and said he would be in his work shop should anyone need him. He was too old for this.

“I’ve been saying that but he wants firm proof. He wants a treaty signed and ready. Vitellozo is without arms, for the love of God and his son and the blasted holy spirit what more does Piero want?”

Francesco was about to say “you. Home and safe because Cesare is a wild boar and is friendly one moment only to maul you the next and sometimes diplomatic immunity doesn’t matter”. But instead he says that Piero wants what Niccolò wants which is a treaty but it’s the other members, don’t you understand? He is not a Cosimo, not a Lorenzo – he will not bend them against their will and the will of the people.

“Times when I miss the Medicis,” Niccolò replied with some amount of impatience and disgust. Francesco’s missive to Florence simply said that the ambassador would do what he could for the greater glory of his city etc. etc. etc.